Ning remained standing in the ruined room for a long while, staring at the empty space where the vision had shown Alya and her child lying dead, while the memories he had inherited from Valen continued moving through his mind with an intensity that made them feel less like information and more like something he had personally experienced.

Ning closed his eyes and took a slow breath, forcing the memories away before they could continue repeating themselves.

Larissa stood a few steps away from him, watching him carefully without knowing whether she should speak.

Ning opened his eyes and turned toward her.

"Please don’t tell anyone that I’m not Valen."

Larissa looked back at him, her expression still affected by what they had just witnessed.

For a moment, Ning expected her to argue, perhaps asking what he really was or what he had done with the actual Valen, but she seemed too mentally exhausted to begin another confrontation after everything she had seen.

"I won’t," she said.

Ning studied her face for a few seconds, searching for any hesitation that might suggest she was merely agreeing because she feared him, but Larissa did not look frightened.

Disturbed and emotionally drained, yes, but not frightened.

"The real Valen is alive," Ning said. "He agreed to leave this world and begin again somewhere else. I didn’t kill him or steal his life against his wishes."

Larissa slowly nodded.

She had already heard parts of the explanation, but Ning felt the need to repeat it now that the reality of his identity had fully settled in her mind.

He did not care whether most people thought he had killed Valen and taken his body, but Larissa worked beside him and had known the man before Ning arrived.

It would be troublesome if every interaction between them became filled with doubt.

Ning looked around the old room one last time, his eyes moving across the faded walls, damaged furniture, and the place where Valen’s life had fallen apart.

There was nothing more for them to see here.

He had found the answer Valen had spent years destroying himself in search of, but that answer had come too late for the man who needed it most.

Ning turned back toward Larissa.

"Do you want to go through your past as well?"

Larissa was struck by a sense of panic upon hearing that.

Her father’s murder had remained unsolved for years, with the investigation leaving behind little more than old photographs, incomplete reports, and suspicions that had never become strong enough to lead anywhere.

Now that she had gained the ability to view the past, the mystery no longer needed to remain one.

They could return to the room where her father had died, reverse the events, and watch exactly what had happened, just as they had done here.

Before entering this house, Larissa had been ready to do that.

She had believed that seeing Alya’s death first would be a way of testing the ability and preparing herself for what she might see when they went through her own past.

Instead, the vision had shown her something far worse than she had expected.

She had watched a mother be forced to see her child die, and even though Larissa had turned away before the final moment, the sounds alone had been enough to remain inside her thoughts.

"No," Larissa said after a while. "Not today."

Ning nodded.

"I’m not ready," she continued. "And you shouldn’t do anything today either. Take some time."

Ning raised an eyebrow slightly.

She had seen the anger in him.

Even if she did not know the extent of his abilities, she understood enough to realize that Ning could most likely leave the country and find the elves immediately if he chose to.

Perhaps she believed she was stopping him from making an impulsive mistake, although the word mistake did not feel appropriate for what Ning intended to do.

Leamor deserved what was coming.

Still, Larissa was right about one thing.

Ning needed time to think.

"That’s fine," he said.

The two left the ruined home shortly afterward, stepping back into the quiet street where the ordinary movements of the city continued without any awareness of what they had witnessed inside.

Cars moved along the distant road, people walked beneath the streetlights, and the windows of the surrounding houses glowed with signs of families living their regular lives.

Larissa remained silent as they walked.

Ning did not attempt to begin another conversation.

When they reached the end of the street, Larissa left to return to her own home, while Ning chose not to fly away.

He simply began walking.

New Limaro was too large for him to cross on foot in a reasonable amount of time if he were an ordinary person, but Ning had nowhere specific he wanted to go, so distance did not matter.

He followed whichever road looked more interesting, passing through quiet residential districts before reaching streets that remained busy even this late in the evening.

Bright signs shone above restaurants and bars, illuminating people of dozens of races as they moved between buildings.

A group of young goblins argued outside a theater.

A Centaur pulled a carriage filled with packages along a road specially widened for people of his size.

A pair of fairies flew between the upper floors of two buildings, carrying food that looked far too heavy for their tiny bodies.

Ning watched all of it without truly focusing on anything.

Most of his attention remained on what he had learned.

Alya had been royalty, or at least close enough to royalty that her blood could be used by someone who wished to take the throne of Faedria.

She had escaped her country, crossed the ocean, and hidden in Conjora, where she had met Valen and created a life that had nothing to do with the people she had left behind.

Then Leamor found her.

Ning did not know how long the man had searched or what resources he had used, but finding a single High-Elf in a city the size of New Limaro after years had passed could not have been easy.

Leamor had wanted Alya alive when he entered the house.

That much had been clear.

He had spoken of taking her back and making her his wife, which meant the murder had not been planned from the beginning.

The child had changed everything.

Ning walked through an intersection and waited until he reached a quieter street before finally speaking.

"System, who is Leamor?"

Ning continued walking as the System’s information appeared.

"Tell me more."

Ning frowned slightly.

"So Larissa was right. The civil unrest she remembered was connected to this."

"What happened after the King died?"